High Risk Business and activities

A. Financial products and services

  1. Investment and brokerage services
  2. Lending services
  3. Buy Now Pay Later services
  4. Crowdfunding
  5. Debt collection agencies
  6. Insurance services including medical benefit packages
  7. Money transmitters, currency exchange services and other money services businesses
  8. Neobanks / challenger banks
  9. Other financial institutions

B. Government services

  1. Government grants
  2. Embassy, foreign consulate, or other foreign governments

C. Pharmaceuticals and telemedicine

  1. Online pharmacies
  2. Prescription-only products including card-not-present pharmaceuticals
  3. Telemedicine and telehealth services

D. Tobacco

  1. Tobacco products including e-cigarettes and e-liquid

E. Gambling

  1. Games of chance including gambling, internet gambling, sweepstakes and contests, fantasy sports leagues with for a monetary or material prize
  2. Sports forecasting or odds making with a monetary or material prize
  3. Lotteries
  4. Bidding fee auctions

F. Travel

  1. Travel reservation services and clubs
  2. Airlines and cruises
  3. Timeshare services is a shared ownership model of vacation real estate in which multiple buyers own the rights to use the same property at different times.

G. Non-fiat currency and stored value

  1. Virtual and cryptocurrencies and mining services
  2. Prepaid phone cards, sim cards, and phone services
  3. Sale of stored value or credits maintained, accepted and issued by anyone other than the seller
  4. Sale of in-game currency or game items, unless the merchant is the operator of the virtual world

H. Multi-level marketing

  1. Businesses where sellers get their revenue both from selling items and from signing up new sellers
  2. Network marketing and referral marketing programs
  3. Shipping and forwarding brokers

I. Shipping/ Delivery

  1. Future delivery (more than 14 days)
  2. Shipping brokers
  3. Forwarding brokers
  4. Drop shipping

J. Charity

  1. Charity sweepstakes and raffles for the explicit purpose of fundraising
  2. Unregistered charities

K. MCC by type

  1. Artist supply and craft shops
  2. Tourist attractions and exhibits
  3. Travel agencies and tour operators
  4. Real Estate Agents
  5. Lodging – hotels, motels and resorts
  6. Dating, Escort Services
  7. Membership clubs (sports, recreation, athletic), country clubs and private golf courses
  8. Advertising services
  9. Computer programming, data processing and integrated systems design services
  10. Accounting, Auditing, and Bookkeeping Services
  11. Religious Goods Stores

L. Nature of products and services

  1. Virtual, intangible
  2. inherently higher likelihood of customer dissatisfaction
  3. with ambiguous legality or may be illegal in some areas
  4. Membership
  5. No specific products/ services
  6. counterfeit/ forged/ unauthentic products

M. Payment methods

  1. Prepayment (full payment)
  2. Deposit (further payment required)
  3. Cash coupon/ gift card
  4. Package

N. Others

  1. Credit card and identity theft protection services
  2. Other age restricted goods or services

Last update: Apr 2023